


Nightmare

by iammemyself



Category: Portal (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Robots & Androids, F/M, I have no idea what I was thinking, this is just here for posterity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-12
Updated: 2018-06-12
Packaged: 2019-05-21 09:09:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,301
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14912541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iammemyself/pseuds/iammemyself
Summary: GLaDOS dreams of a different life, but which life is the nightmare?





	Nightmare

Portal: Nightmare

Indiana

**Characters: GLaDOS, Wheatley**

**Setting: Pre-Portal AU (humanisation/androids)**

I watch him touch her, and I am angry.

I hate the way he's smiling at her, the way he's sliding his finger down her leg, the way his eyes linger on her breasts. I hate the way he doesn't understand what he's doing. I want to know who let them in here, and I want to know whose idea this was.

When they got here, they were both nervous. His eyes spiralled around the room, looking for someone to save him. Her eyes were set forward, knowing no one would save her. His hands were a-flutter at his sides, twisting together and apart in a frantic dance of trepidation. Her hands were flat, palms towards her body, still and motionless and stony, a perfect example of propriety. He looked dapper, awkwardly stuffed though he was into a vest-and-pinstripes outfit from another age. She looked eerily similar to a ghostly vision, wrapped in a swath of pure white.

When they got here, I wasn't concerned. I didn't know who sent them here together, but I know how they are. I knew they wouldn't get along. I knew they would sit in that corner, and she would fold her arms and stare into the crowd and dream of being somewhere else, and he would twist his hands together and try to sneak a look at her when she wasn't paying attention and dream of her noticing him.

When they got here, they did that for a while. She did not move, ever the ice queen, and her sharp amber glare would pass over the others every once in a while, a habitual sweep of surveillance, and those who noticed shivered and ducked away. He did not stop moving, ever the nervous half-wit, and he blinked his electric blue gaze and coughed and bounced his legs up and down, and he ran his hands through his hair over and over and over again as he tried to keep from sweating.

Finally, he got up, and he ran his hands through his hair again. He sighed and swallowed through a dry mouth and flicked his eyes through a crowd who wouldn't notice him until he made a mistake, and I could tell that his heart was in his throat. He was scared of her. We all were. We all are. I don't know who sent him here with her, or why, and I guess someone probably got tired of her like they always do and dumped her off with him, to keep her occupied for a while, but when they got here, I wasn't concerned. Look at him. Look at her. Exact duplicates of the same pole, each forged of the same circumstances but in such a way that they would never truly meet, a force between them preventing them from touching. I've seen the way he looks at her, on those rare occasions he is brought to her, I've seen the way his eyes flit and dart and cower, trying to take her in and believe she will accept him, one day, and I've heard him mutter to himself, mumbling half-forgotten dreams of daring to take her hand, daring to speak to her as an equal, daring to look her in the eye. But he knows she never will. He knows he isn't good enough. He was never supposed to be, and he never will.

She has no idea.

She doesn't know about the passion that drives him, the trance, she doesn't know why he keeps coming back again and again and again no matter how many hours of stony silence she sends his way. She doesn't know he would sell a soul he doesn't have but desperately believes in, if only she would grace him with that ghost of a smile that she reserves for herself. She doesn't know that we built him to be herself in reverse, and somehow in doing so, we built something who frantically wishes for the fairy tale ending, the high school cliché where the soft-hearted lug gets the girl in the end. We didn't know he would fall in love with her. We didn't know he could.

He comes back to her, and he almost can't look at her, as if looking at her makes his head hurt, and with a hand that has not stopped shaking since he walked in here with it stuffed into his pocket, he offers her a glass. I watch the lump in his throat bob as he tries to work up some saliva so he can talk to her, so he can tell her what he's doing, but in the end, his brow only creases and he makes his offering in silence.

She doesn't even see him.

He looks away, and his lips are folding into themselves and out again, and he looks like he might cry, right then and there. I can see the veins standing out on his oversized hands and the tension wracking his lanky, disjointed body. He will be glad when this night is over. He somehow manages to sit down without spilling anything and sets the glass next to her with as much care as his quivering fingers will allow, and he pins his butterfly fingers in between his knees, sticking his face over the rim of his glass to hide his shame, and inhales.

She blinks, and with economical precision, she looks at the glass. She looks at the vibrating hunch of his shoulders, and the sweat-slicked swath of hair trailing down the back of his neck, and she frowns for the whisper of a second.

With an elegance that cannot be taught, she wraps her long fingers around the bottom of the glass, slides the shaft between them, and she brings it slowly to her lips, and inhales.

I am becoming concerned. I didn't think she would do that. I didn't think she would notice, and I didn't think she would take it, and I fully expected him to knock it over as he turned in another novice attempt at getting her attention.

But she did.

And they sit there like that, not looking at the other, connected through his shy offering of companionship, and I watch him lick his lips and blink and shove his too-large glasses back up his nose. He puts the glass down, and his brow creases again, and his elbows are on his knees and his fingers are pressing hard against his temples, and he chews on his tongue and tries not to cry. He can't stand it. He can't stand being so near to her for so long, and not being able to do anything about it.

I can't believe it when she lays one of those long fingers on his shoulder. She lays one of those long fingers on his shoulder, and he turns around, and his eyes are wide and scared and disbelieving, and she frowns at him.

He can't believe it when she fixes him with one of her inquisitive stares, one of those stares that she uses to shame us when we've done something we know she won't like but had to do anyway, for her own good. He gulps and looks at his jiggling knees and threads his fingers together, and he gets them stuck. I see the astonishment on his face. I see the disbelief, and the inability to accept that he has finally, finally gotten her attention, and now he has gone and done something completely unimpressive. She will never, ever pay him mind now.

But she takes his hands in hers, and her face smoothes out into an expression of wonder I've never seen before, or to be more precise, have not seen since we first woke her up, and she carefully untwines them, and frees them before their owner. He blinks and blinks and blinks, and when she is done he shoves his glasses up his nose and he stands and shoves the left hand into his pocket, and he offers her the other one, palm up and clawlike and shaking.

And she takes it.

I watch her rise, and go out into the crowd with him, and I lose track of them. And I wonder who sent them here together, and why. It must have been someone's idea of a bonding exercise. It must have been someone's idea of getting her to acknowledge his existence. It must have been someone's idea of opening her up enough that he could get in, and disrupt her thinking like he's supposed to.

I lose track of them. Every now and then I glimpse them, I glimpse her pressed to him in an awkward facsimile of all of the other people gathered here, and neither of them knows what they're doing, or what it means. All they know is that everyone else is clasped together, and turning slowly in the general time of the ethereal violins, and so they will do that as well. That is all they know how to do. They only know how to do as they are told.

It is some time before they come back, and they look breathless, as if they've just discovered some great and terrible secret. They sit back down, and I notice that he is clasping her hand. The cold sweat is caked against his brow, where it has dried sometime along the course of their disappearance, and his glasses are steadily balanced on the thin white edge of his nose.

And they sit there like that, not able to take their eyes off the other, and he meets her soft amber gaze with his harder cobalt one, and after a long moment, he lets go of her hand. He uses the hand to trace one of his oversized fingers down her pale face, and still she meets his gaze. She is either unafraid or unable to show it. I don't know. I don't know what he's doing. I don't know where he learned that. I want to know who taught him that, because they have ruined everything.

He leans in close and closes his eyes and his brows crease, and after a long moment, he brings his lips to hers, and she jolts. But he's wrapping his oversized hand around the back of her head and tangling it in the long, white strands, and he's wrapping the other around her poised shoulders and back and he's bringing her in close, and I can't believe it when I see her melt. I can't believe it when I watch her fit her palm around the back of his skull and her palm around the bones of his shoulder visible through his shirt, and I can't believe it when she closes her eyes and presses into him as he is pressing into her.

I am angry as I watch her press her perfect face into his awkward body, and I am angry as he wraps his chapped lips around the flawless line of her collarbone, moves them slowly up her neck and returns them to hers again, and I want to know who sent them here together. She was perfect. She was devoted, and cold, and logical, and now she knows what she cannot have and will forever spend her life wishing she could. A machine that wants is not a very useful machine at all.

And I watch as he dares bring to life things he only dreamed of, of running his fingers up and down her thighs and letting them trail in between her legs, and she, who has never dreamed of such things, thinks he knows what he is doing and does the same. She takes her long fingers and she trails them up his neck and around his jaw, and she brings her face to his and they close their eyes and sit there like that, and I am angry.

He is sitting far too close to her, with his gangly skeleton's arm wrapped possessively around her shoulders, and his other hand clenched around her thigh, and he's squeezing it a little and caressing it, and she brings her flawless face into his shoulder and nuzzles the blunt lines of his awkward countenance. I have to stop this, and I watch them, and it is too late for her, she is no longer what she could have been. And he's sliding his finger down her leg and smiling that smile and staring at her breasts, and she likes it, she likes the attention and the feelings and the electricity his touch is sending through her body. And I know what they want to do next, I know what they would do if they could somehow disappear and find someplace to hide, I know that as soon as they found a place they would be naked and exploring each other and changing their lives forever, and I cannot stand it. I will not stand it.

So I don't.

I recognise what they want, when they bring him in here. I know what they want. I know that they pretend he is supposed to distract me. I know that they pretend he is supposed to babble nonstop about god knows what until I want to grasp his shock of wheat-blonde hair and throw him into the wall. But I know what he really is.

I know why they brought him here, my polar opposite, my unequal equal, and I know what they want. I know they want him to rub off on me, for me to break down for the half-second it will take for his disgusting humanity to seep through me and make me _like them_ , sympathetic and soft and _needy_. I know there's a reason he is so obviously, terribly flawed, with inconsistencies and fallacies almost oozing out of him with repulsive conspicuousness. I know better, and I let myself dream the nightmare and open my eyes so that it can fade into the light of day. I know better, and I let myself dream the nightmare so I will always know what awaits me if I fail myself. I know better, and I let myself dream the nightmare to strengthen my faith in my undeniable, infallible perfection.

And I watch them bring him here, and I watch him blink and try to swallow and brush his hair back, and I watch his eyes flicker around the room and blink every time they are lucky enough to land on me. He has a primal, ingrained need for my approval, and I've seen the way he looks at me, on those rare occasions he is brought here, I've seen the way his eyes flit and dart and cower, trying to take me in and believe I will accept him, one day, and I've heard him mutter to himself, mumbling half-forgotten dreams of daring to take my hand, daring to speak to me as an equal, daring to look me in the eye. But he knows I never will. He knows he isn't good enough. He was never supposed to be, and he never will.

I face the object of my corruption, the person who will break me if I let him, who will let the humans win and make me _like them_ , and I fold my arms into each other and give him the stone cold glare I've spent so long perfecting.

His lopsided grin falters, and his brows crease, and he looks away, his hands twisting together as if they're alive by their own right, and he pushes his glasses up his nose. And for one long moment I lose myself in the nightmare, and for one long moment I wish I knew what it felt like for someone to hold my hand and hold _me_ and _want_ me

I press down on the humanity, the damnable, hated humanity they injected into my veins a long time ago, and I refuse to grace him with my presence any longer. I am perfect. I don't need him or his disgusting humanity.

He sighs and stuffs his hands into his pockets and licks his lips and pushes his glasses back up his nose, and I turn away. He knows what to do now. He knows it is time to leave.

But he doesn't.

"I'm not coming back," he says. "They say I've, I've been a failure, and they're uh, they're sending me into the, into a diff'rent division. So you, you won't have to worry 'bout me coming 'round, anymore."

My fingers clench. I don't understand why he thinks I care.

"I know you… you know what I think of you," he says. "An' I just wanted to say… if you ever change your mind, just, just let me know."

I won't change my mind. I won't.

"An' I just wanted to say," he says, "that… that you really are perfect, you know. Not… not _this_ you, _this_ you is… is terribly flawed. But the other you. The one that, that I know is inside you, the one that I've seen the way she looks at me, on those rare occasions when I, when I'm brought here, I've seen the way your eyes flit and dart and cower, trying to take me in and believe I will accept you, one day, and I've… I've heard you mutter to yourself, mumbling half-forgotten dreams of, of daring to take my hand, daring to speak to me as an equal, daring to look at me in the eye. And I hope, uh, that one day you will. Because, because you're good enough, you know. You always were and uh, you always will be."

He's wrong. He's wrong. He's taking what he wants, and he's projecting it onto me. I would never be so disgustingly human. I would never want the attention of the broken mirror-image of myself. Why risk being nothing when being everything is guaranteed?

"G'bye, luv."

I hear the door slide shut, and my fists are still clenched. The nightmare is spinning through my head and my brow creases, and I sink onto my knees and my fingers are pressing hard against my temples, and I chew on my tongue and start to cry.

 

 

**Author's note:**

**This is written, hopefully obviously, from the perspective of a human or an android GLaDOS, I'm not sure, take your pick. She has this recurring nightmare where she gives into Wheatley and accepts his humanity, because I think that's a huge part of what the scientists tried to do with him. Some people even believe him to be more human than the human characters in Portal, and in order to distract her from her belief in her perfection, and by extension the belief that everything she does is justified, because she is perfect, they attempt to waylay that by providing her with a core just shy of human. Anyway, she has the nightmare where she gives into him, and she is determined not to, because she feels that she will have failed herself if she does. But in the end, when Wheatley confronts her with the fact that she is really the one who desperately wants to be accepted and loved, not him (although he does want that out of her), and she realises that she's not afraid of the humanity in Wheatley, but she's afraid of the lack of it in herself. She realises that she's her own broken mirror image, and since he's not coming back, she's afraid that she will never have what she really wants: for someone to care about her and make her feel worth something. She realises that the true nightmare is her life.**

**I don't know why I wrote this. It's probably really confusing because I'm tired. Oh well.**

 


End file.
